


The Angel

by ambrosie



Series: And I have been visited by an angel [1]
Category: Le Fantôme de l'Opéra | Phantom of the Opera & Related Fandoms, Phantom - Susan Kay
Genre: F/M, a character study where luciana is not being the worst to erik but that makes it sad as heck, anyway in the usa poto is free real estate so i took it and ran, good lord why did i agree to do this prompt im dying, its sad and im sad, theres vague mention of sex but ok
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-09
Updated: 2020-05-09
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:55:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 878
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24096946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ambrosie/pseuds/ambrosie
Summary: Persia is nothing like Italy, except for one thing. Before Christine, there was beautiful death.
Relationships: Erik | Phantom of the Opera/Luciana (Phantom - Susan Kay)
Series: And I have been visited by an angel [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1738570
Kudos: 6





	The Angel

**Author's Note:**

> From a tumblr prompt 'challenge my writing. send me a word, and i will write a drabble about that topic—but without ever using the word you said. — the word can be anything. try a colour, an emotion, relationships, the weather, or even a name to make me think what that word means to our muses’ dynamic and how can i convey that without saying the word. synonyms are allowed… but let’s try to be creative here, guys.' 
> 
> The name in question, Luciana. 
> 
> For reference, Rafael is the Catholic equivalent of Israfil, the angel of music in Islam.

Persia is not like Italy. this, he thinks in a haze, a numbed state laying in the opulent bed so graciously given to him — a thank you for all that he’d built. _You have built before_ , the khanum had spoken, _built places of great beauty — o Azrael, what do you believe of death? is it beautiful? Will you build a place of beauty here ?_ Is death beautiful? Perhaps. But I am not an angel of death, I am Erik. I am an architect, not an executioner. 

How he’d fallen to his knees before the woman, not by choice, of course. Erik had only ever been willingly on his knees for one. Is death beautiful? I will build your beautiful death, he’d told the khanum, for death is beautiful. 

He thinks of chocolate colored hair, warm eyes. She was so very curious for the entire time they’d known each other. Since he became her father’s apprentice. How often had she asked him of his life, how many times had he responded so flatly: I have only ever been dead. The first time he’d spoken such, he had been startled by the sound of her little foot stamping upon the ground. Stung by her words, her accusations that he was lying to her, that if he was to be her father’s apprentice, she had the right to know him, too. What sort of person had her father brought in? She had the right to know, the right to be safe. She was right. 

His stories were never happy ones, never of love, despite the talents he knew he had. She’d been saddened by the tales and had taken to trying her best not to be so abrasive to him, especially since she knew now. She knew what his life was, that awful existence that truly was barely a life at all. Is death beautiful? 

Over their first year together, she’d shown that she was an artist, a brilliant one. He called her Da Vinci, to which her response was a gentle laugh as clear as a bell: _I am not at all like him, I’m me. There will never be another person like Leonardo_. There will never be another person like you, he wished to say, but certainly he could not. Still, he had soon become her favorite thing to draw, charcoal sketches all over her room. _I love your eyes,_ she’d told him one night, _golden as the dawn, as the trumpets of heaven. Erik, do you believe in God? In His angels? God gave us life, He sets us upon our paths for a reason. Sometimes, we are lucky enough to meet an angel._ Sometimes, we are lucky enough to die, he’d responded. Dinner had ended abruptly, with her frustrated cry and the sound of her door slamming. _All you ever talk about is death, never life! Life is a gift, Erik! When will you see that? Life is so very beautiful! Beautiful as your music, I hear you sing late at night, this gift from God, how dare you speak of death when you have been given so much?_

The years passed and he was no longer an awkward boy of fifteen, but an elegant young man of twenty. She was no longer the wisp of a girl, but a young woman almost twenty-one. Surely, her father was not blind to what was happening between them, how her art had changed. She drew him often, but it was different. She drew him as he worked, enthralled by the way muscle moved beneath skin, by this form of his that she often compared to a wild-cat. Strong and silent and graceful. _You’re the most beautiful work of art I’ve ever seen, she’d told him._ You shouldn’t say such things before you know for certain. They argued again that night, although her father knew that the sounds from his youngest daughter’s room were not cries of anger. Not the entire time. After all, she was doing what she could to show his apprentice that life was as beautiful as she said.   


But, death was beautiful, too. 

She asked the next morning to see him, all of him. _I deserve to see the face of my future husband! Erik, you can’t hide from me anymore! Don’t you trust me?_ She’d followed him to the rooftop, demanded to see him, her greatest muse, her beautiful lover, and finally he could no longer stand it. The mask fell and then— 

_Angel. I have been visited by an angel_ , she cried, hand over her mouth as she stepped back. _Angel of music, God has sent you from Heaven, why did you say you were Erik? Am I unworthy of your true name, Angel of music, Rafael_ — the name she screamed when she lost her footing, reached for him, _Angel, save me! Erik!_ And he wasn’t fast enough. 

Death was so very beautiful, with her crimson halo blooming from her chocolate hair. Death was beautiful and eternally young, and eternally in love with an angel. 

Persia was nothing like Italy, except for one thing. Here, he saw beautiful death again and again, awake and asleep calling him a name he hoped he would never have to hear from living lips again— _Angel of music!_


End file.
